General Dempsey: ‘Winning Our Nation’s Wars is No Longer Enough’ by Walter Pincus, Washington Post.
“For the first time our competence and character are being evaluated by experts and pundits while we fight.”
That was Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Martin Dempsey speaking frankly to field-grade officers graduating June 13 from National Defense University (NDU) about what he called “this time of turmoil” when the military is “working hard to adapt to uncertainty and rapidly changing geopolitical, budgetary and cultural landscapes.” ...
Comments
I think the Chairman does protest too much. It’s an American tradition for the peoples’ representatives, experts and pundits to question military competence and character while in the fight. This tradition which stretches nearly unbroken from St. Clair’s Defeat in the Northwest Indian War (1791), the war of 1812, the Mexican War, Civil War, Spanish American War, WWI, WWII, Vietnam, through to today. Just look up some of the editorials from the Civil War or question from Congress concerning US Army competence in the closing hours of WWI as a point of reference.
This is not something new in and of itself. The only thing that is new is the speed and limited depth of discussion with policy making and communications between Congress, other stakeholders, and the services. Unfortunately, it’s a discussion that the military leadership does not appear to be capable of having in any type of coherent manner.